{"id":578,"date":"2023-07-13T15:50:19","date_gmt":"2023-07-13T15:50:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2023arles\/?p=578"},"modified":"2023-07-14T14:58:00","modified_gmt":"2023-07-14T14:58:00","slug":"a-taste-of-the-camargue","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/a-taste-of-the-camargue\/","title":{"rendered":"A gin that tastes of the Camargue"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Sophie Wyckoff<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After 14 years working in marketing and communications for L’Occitane en Provence in London, Thomas Bigourdan was ready for a change. A visit to a gin distillery gave him an idea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was while I was visiting a distillery in the East of London that I started imagining my distillery,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2018, he founded Bigourdan Distillerie de Camargue<\/a>, a gin distillery in Arles, that uses local products like immortelle (eternal flower), lavender, sage and thyme from the region to create a unique flavor. The gin is made from 13 ingredients, most of them grown in the Camargue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wanted to make a \u2018real\u2019 London Dry, fairly classic and recognizable, then give it a sharp, almost brutal Camargue temperament,\u201d he said in an interview posted on the company\u2019s website. \u201cI started from the sensations and impressions that can be experienced in the Camargue – the gasp, the salt crunching underfoot, the sand burned by the sun – to translate them into taste.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bigourdan said immortelle, tiny yellow flowers picked from the Camargue, give a warm and dry finish to the gin. Immortelle<\/a> is also an antimicrobial compound that promotes skin cell regeneration and is used as an essential oil. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Customers browse in the Bigourdan shop in Arles. Photo by Sophie Wyckoff.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Currently, two flavors of gin are available to purchase, the original and the limited edition summer flavor, which includes essence of citrus. The limited edition is distilled in two batches which contain 500 liters, so when the product is gone, it\u2019s gone. The original flavor and limited edition summer flavor come in a 50-centiliter bottle. The original sells for 41 euros, and the summer flavor for 43 euros.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On top of gin, Bigourdan also produces and sells three ready-to-serve cocktails. Negroni Matador uses the Immortelle plant for a maple syrup taste, Soho Negroni is a sweet orange taste, and the N\u00b01 Negroni has a lemon and orange zest that grows at the foot of the distillery. The three bottles are packaged together for a selling price of 52 euros. 
<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Photo by Sophie Wyckoff.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Bigourdan initially faced many challenges as a solo entrepreneur. He states how stressful his job was and how \u201cyou do everything on your own and can only count on yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Sophie Wyckoff After 14 years working in marketing and communications for L’Occitane en Provence in London, Thomas<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":581,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[71,72],"class_list":["post-578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","tag-bigourdan-distillerie-de-camargue","tag-gin"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/Wykoff-featured_Ehlers-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=578"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":719,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/578\/revisions\/719"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=578"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=578"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projects.ieimedia.com\/2025arles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=578"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}